1. Field of the Invention
The present invention refers to a process for the production of cards with images and to a relative image card.
2. Description of Related Art
As is known, there are available on the market various types of cards, generally of paper or cardboard, which depict various types of images, generally holy images. Such a type of image card is commonly known as a holy card.
On the back of the holy card there are generally reproduced words related to the image shown and personalised according to the use of the holy card.
For production of holy cards use is generally made of a large-sized sheet on which a number of windows with the image to be depicted are printed, generally by offset printing. The sheet is subsequently sent to a punch cutter which microperforates the sheet along the perimeter of the image windows by means of suitable punches.
Said printed, microperforated sheets are subsequently sent to special printing machines, such as photocopiers or dot impact printers or inkjet printers which print the customised wording on the back of each holy card. Lastly, the holy cards are separated from each by breaking the perforated strips.
Furthermore, there exist on the market holy cards which, after offset printing, are coated by hot overprinting, for example in the background and the outlines of the image, with a decorative layer containing pigments of noble metals, such as gold, silver and the like.
These hot-decorated holy cards present the drawback that the decorative layer does not fix well to the offset print of the holy card and therefore if the decorative layer is subjected to heat or friction, small fragments thereof tend to become detached. As a result, if a sheet treated with this decorative layer is inserted in a laser printer or a photocopier for the writing on the back of the holy card, the heat of the machine and rubbing with the rollers of the printing machine would tend to detach some fragments of the decorative layer which would foul the printing rollers, damaging the machine.
For this reason perforated sheets bearing a plurality of holy cards coated with a decorative layer do not exist on the market. In fact, holy cards with a decorative layer are produced individually, so as to be able to be printed on the back, without having to pass between the printing rollers, but for example by means of pressure printing between plates.